“It’s never been checked out,” Lisbeth hissed. A woman two tables over fluttered her wings and a man wearing headphones that she suspected might be a technowizard looked up at the disturbance before going back to their respective archive projects.
She blushed, cleared her throat, and remembered her scribe’s vocal training. A low tone and soft voice carried less than a whisper, despite the echoes of the archival hall. “Sorry. We’re running low on space, that’s all, and there’s not a single record of anyone using this book.”
Lisbeth thumped the book down atop the librarians’ shared counter and felt her cheeks flame as the library’s users stared.
“Let me see that file.” Richard coolly pushed his spectacles toward glassy blue eyes with an ink-stained finger. “Ah, yes, this one. It stays.”
“A single look and that’s it?” Lisbeth was quietly outraged. “We have four hundred tomes in transit, and there’s not enough room.”
“True,” Richard answered amiably. His authority and calm befitted the head librarian position, as did his patience. “I applaud your candor and willingness to speak up, Cadet Lisbeth. Tell me, however, where do we work?”
She stuttered. “The – the library.” Her voice rose until it was nearly a question.
“Indeed,” Richard answered, pressing the tome into her waiting arms. “More specifically?”
“The King’s library?” She glanced around at his gesture for her to continue. “The…the magic library.”
“Uncouth to put it so bluntly, but yes, we are in charge of the kingdom’s archives, both magical and historical.” He leaned forward, sharp-pointed nose zooming so close she nearly forgot to look beyond the cracked glass of his lenses. “And what do you think happens every so often in a magical library?”
“We run out of room,” Lisbeth said uncomfortably, and tugged the book close to her robes.
“And what do you think happens when a magical library runs out of room?”
She shook her head, confused.
“It grows,” he said softly.
Lisbeth’s internship hadn’t felt real until that moment. Her own magics were small, and it was easy to think of the larger magics as illusions, or powered by technowizard mechanics.
Now the weight of her chosen career field began sinking onto her shoulders, and she felt every missed drop of the caffe she’d missed this morning as she struggled to study the hall that had seemed so familiar only moments before. “It grows,” she repeated. “Grows?”
“This particular book catches fire whenever it leaves the protections of this hall,” Richard said quietly. “Balefire. The pages aren’t damaged.”
Gulping, she realized the implication, and hastily shoved the volume back onto the shelves. “But the person carrying it…”
He nodded. “It will never be checked out.”
***
A fun one from Parrish Baker this week, with a bit of a tweak: The librarian discovered that one book in the collection had never been checked out—and when she opened it, she understood why.
And hey, it was a trade week, so check out what Parrish did with mine: “Of course it’s only cheesecake.”
Find more and play along, over at More Odds Than Ends!
